Far From Home
by J3FAwesome
Summary: A new take on an age old story. Vince, a young Italian man, with his mother and sister dead and his father nowhere to be found, he arrives in an unfamiliar city and encounters the underdogs of Stilwater, The Third Street Saints. Disclaimer: I do not own anything besides my character Vince and other OC's in the later series. R&R is greatly appreciated.
1. Chapter 1

Far From Home

Chapter 1: From Humble Beginnings

Life seemed to shift into the fast lane once I came back to my hometown, one minute I was walking down the slums of Stilwater wondering what I would do with my pocket full of chump change, then the next being in the midst of a gang war, ducking and scrambling for cover from the hail of bullets that flew above my head, their high pitched whistles making my ears ring.

Once thinking my bad luck, and timing had ceased, it seems it had another trick up it's sleeve as a wannabe gangster with the signature sagging pants, loose clothing and sideways gun that was currently pressed against my temple.

Of course, traveling for years I had become accustomed to the strange way people in other countries greeted one another, but this was ridiculous.

Looking up towards the young, diminutive, black male with a stubbly soulpatch and shaved head brought a bit of humor to my heart, until I had remembered he had a pistol aimed for my head, which forced my growing grin to fade.

"Wrong time, wrong place homie" He said in a cold tone, sending a shiver down my spine and made me realize that the kid had the balls to back up his attitude and cockiness, a feature I couldn't see in today's media obsessed youth.

In a swift moment, the recent events began to register in my mind and I quickly sprung into action by kicking out my right leg until my boot connected with the young male's thin knee, he cried out in response and fell backwards, landing hard on the ground and sending his pistol skidding away until hitting the broken and foliage infested concrete wall I had been backed into.

Once glancing away from the young man yelling in pain and holding his knee as small spurts of blood seeped from his thin fingers, I noticed the pistol laying in the dirt, giving me the opportunity to get out of this situation.

I used all the strength in my legs to propell my body forward across the cracked asphalt until my hand met the all to familiar cold steel and jumped to my feet to face my flailing attacker.

Just as if it were the flip of the switch, the young male's former cocky attitude turned immedialty into fear as I aimed the large, heavy handgun between his eyes.

"You shouldn't point a gun at someone, it's not very polite" I cooed lowly, a small smile crept across my features as stalked forward until the barrel pressed against the bridge of his nose.

"Please man-don't-don't kill me.." The young man pleaded, crawling backwards leaving a trail of dark, almost black liquid on the ground as he shifted, attempting to avoid the barrel

"Karma's a bitch" I replied in the same cold tone he gave me, before I knew it a loud, ringing crack erupted from my left side and before I could turn to face who or whatever made the sound, the young gangster fell back as if a hammer had struck his chest, blood poured from a smoking gunshot in the center of his forehead.

"You look lost son" A middle aged man sporting a greying beard, black leather coat and turtle neck sweater, he was accompanied by a much younger white male who looked to have cop written all over him, with combed back brown hair, dark mustache and goatee, but what really stood out was a color I had never seen around before, purple.

"Actually I'm not, this is as close to home as I can get now" I replied, not loosening the grip on the pistol in my hand once noticing the young goon held the revolver that must have killed the wannabe gangster.

"You don't look like the kind that call Stilwater home, you live around here kid?" The older man questioned, his follower sighed in impatience as he slowly aimed his revolver around the empty streets.

"Not recently, just got back from being deployed" I responded, feeling more at ease towards his calm mannered tone.

"Well that sure is interesting, but the Row's not a safe place anymore son, seems like every motherfucka is spilling blood to fight for every inch of territory, it's a stalemate" He explained, running a hand across his rough features.

"Julius, this ain't the best time to be recruiting, cops are on their way" The younger man finally spoke up, jerking his head in the direction opposite of where their stood.

"Listen son, if you want to be apart of the solution, now's your chance" He offered a thickly calloused hand towards me, I admired his bravery considering I was holding a fully loaded pistol in my hand.

"Come on we gotta go!" The young man continued to protest.

"In a minute Troy" He snapped back, in which the recruit threw his hands up in defeat, and cursed under his breathe.

In a split second I had inner conflict erupt from within my mind, one side telling me to run while I can, while the other urged me to follow this older man and help make a change in this crumbling city.

But before I could answer, a few cop cars drifted around a sharp turn and skidded to a stop a mere few feet away and within seconds we were surrounded by a few underpaid, overweight cops that probably would've wasted us if we held up a donut shop.

"Put your hands up now!" The middle officer yelled a bit more aggressively than normal, making his high pitched voice crack.

"See if you can do it instead pig!" Troy shouted back, raising his revolver and firing a few stray rounds towards the officers, making them duck for cover.

"Come on!" Julius commanded, gripping my forearm in a forceful manner and hauled me towards an empty and moonlight lit alleyway littered with rotting trash, boxes that held god knows what, and prostitutes pleasing their clients behind dumpsters which were not concealing enough.

"Ugh.." I commented while sprinting past a large woman on her knees in front of a sweaty bussiness man, the two men continued bobbing and weaving through the mixed obstacles of fences and cars as if they were pros.

I struggled to keep up as the sirens drew nearer, and nearer. Once running for what felt like an hour, I hunched over, sucking in air as if I had broke the surface of water, my heart rate was beyond fast and repetitive, and I could feel it pounding in my chest and ears, I looked around and noticed we stopped in a rundown open parking lot with an alleyway that led towards the old abandoned church.

"You okay playa?" The older man walked over and set his hand on my upper back, I only waved him off in response as I was unable to speak.

"You can't be fuckin' serious Julius! This kid almost got us arrested!" The white male jabbed an accusing finger in my direction and shouted at the older man.

"Watch yourself Troy, remember where you stand" The older man threatened, grasping his exerted arm and pulled him to a rusty, metal fence that lined the outside of a rundown bar across the alleyway and began to conversate in a low volume I was unable to eavesdrop into.

After regaining composure, I began to notice a few silhouettes wander in the dark as i wandered down the alleyway towards the church, as if they were animals, stalking their prey. Once feeling a bit uneased by my surroundings, I looked to the metal fence and noticed the two men had seemed to have completly vanished into the night.

A figure of a man began to emerge from the shadows, his dark tinted glasses gleamed with the reflection of the full moon in his lense, a wicked smirk began to form across his lips

He couldn't have been much younger than the man who had shot the gang banger, but he did stand out due to his snow like, spiked up hair and Eurasian features.

Once allowing a quick moment to observe his attire from his dark, scruffy boots, worn slacks and opened purple dress shirt with a white tank top underneath, I had realized that this was probably of of the older man's followers, but considering he was nowhere to be found I couldn't allow the Asian man to distract me from the lingering bodies beside him.

"Let's see what you got pretty boy.." He threatened lowly, raising the wooden baseball that rested across his upper back and ended over the edge of his left shoulder and pointed it towards my head.

As if one cue, the silhouettes moved forward into the light revealing their grins that matched their 'leader's'. Within seconds I was bumrushed by 3 large men clad in purple, each wielding a various weapon.

Before I could draw my own weapon, I was abruptly tackled from my blind side onto the cold concrete. I looked up towards my attacker, he looked to be another wannabe gangster and was close to half my size, I immedialty swung a fist and connected with his thin jaw, sending the smaller man to the ground beside me, his mouth began to pour blood.

Getting back to my feet I came face to chest with a substantially larger thug, whom cracked his neck and knuckles before slamming an oversized into my face, I felt my lip bust on impact as I fell back down onto the all to familiar ground.

"I'm gonna enjoy this" The larger black male smiled down at me, grabbing a fist full of my T-shirt and raised my upper body until I hovered inches above the asphalt, and sent rough knuckles into my face until I was close to blacking out.

Feeling the metallic taste of blood oozing down the side of my mouth and filling my cheek, I looked towards a blurry object a few inches away from my hand, without a second thought I secured it within my palm and smashed a 2x4 over his large, stubbly head.

But unlike the movies, cracking a board over a guys head doesn't work out so well. Instead he acted as if I had hit him with a pillow and just shrugged off the hit, and continued to beat my face in.

The darkness was creeping into my vision and I knew if I didn't figure something out now I would end up dead or a hospital, once looking towards the larger man's crotch I realized my knee was dangerously close, and took a desperate move and sent a flying knee into his family jewels.

A loud groan and thud was all I heard as the monster sized man fell to the ground, clutching his injured manhood. A few more goons began to take his place as they saw an opportunity to finish me off, but to no avail.

The mooks were put down with rather ease, either a crack to the jaw, or a boot to the gut and they were on the ground crying obscenities.

I had returned to the large man I delivered a knee to and drew the pistol from the back waistband of my jeans, I spit the blood I held in my mouth and watched it splat on his jagged, sweaty face and raised the barrel to his head.

"This time I'm claiming the kill" I growled, cocking back the hammer and running my finger along the cold, hard trigger tempting me to pull it, but instead of seeing fear in the man's eyes, I saw humor as he began to chuckle maniacally.

"What the fuck is-" I tried to say until a hard object struck my hand, knocking the heavy pistol from my hands and before I could react it struck again, hitting my face this time and breaking my nose on impact.

I flew back from the force of the hit, time seemed to slow down as I saw the blood shoot from the broken cartilage and float in mid air.

I continued to observe my surroundings when I noticed who hit me, the young asian male who sent his goons out to kill me, he seemed to have slowed in time much like everything else, the force exerted showing on his face, eyes clenched and the same wicked smile on his thin lips.

Once my back hit the ground, I quickly lost my ability to breathe. I struggled to supply my lungs with any sort of oxegen so I wouldn't suffocate, but it was a lost cause. I coughed and wheezed as my broken nose continued to create a river of blood that flowed down my cheeks.

Above me gasping corpse was the cocky man, stalking closer and closer with his now bloody baseball grazing against my chest and pressing against my chin, I winced in pain and recoiled back attempting to escape.

Instead he raised the bat high as if to finish me off, but quickly came to a standstill as a familiar voice called out for him to stop, and surprisingly he did.

I felt the dark begin to creep back into my vision as the older man kneeled down over me, his dark eyes meeting mine and suddenly I pieced together what had occured.

"You still alive in there?" He questioned me, grasping my hand within his and lifting me up and looking over my injuries. I smacked his hand away and began to reach for my pistol until I realized it was knocked away by that goon, who currently leaned against a dingy, graffiti covered wall with fading red bricks.

"What the fuck was this about!?" I screamed at him, and witheld my urge to make him kiss my fist.

"Well your welcome" He replied in a monotone, standing and dusting off his jeans, he walked over towards another man wearing a sideways visor and jean jacket and the 'cop' from earlier.

"Welcome? Your damn 'peacekeepers' nearly beat me to death!" I continued to shout until the Asian man huffed in impatience and pushed off from the wall, the bright lit end of his cigarette illuminated his face, revealing his smirk.

"Listen kid, you got what was coming to you" The Asian spoke up, taking a drag of his cigarette and exhaled, creating a cloud of smoke that hovered around his head, I only sighed and rolled my eyes.

"Anyways, be happy man you made it through canonization!" A young recruit with a baseball cap and a scruffy jaw beard exclaimed as he set his hand on my shoulder, making me jump in response.

"Canonization?" I repeated a few times until I had remembered that it was a way of industing new members into a gang, other than being 'sexed in'. I'd take the beating anyday.

"Yeah, welcome to The Saints" The Asian responded, flicking his smoke in my direction, the smoldering cancer stick rechoched off of my chest and landed in a broken hole in the asphalt and was smothered out in the muddy water.


	2. Chapter 2

Far From Home

Chapter 2: Life In The Fast Lane

After taking a few moments to rationalize what I had endured completly baffled my mind, first off I hardly escape from a gang feud, then meet an older man and his lackey who supposebly offered an opportunity to make a change of this lost cause that is Stilwater.

And now, I stand before a liutenant of the saints his words echoing throughout my mind, it wasn't until the older man, who I suspected was the leader had waved an aging hand in front of my face, knocking me from my trance.

"Let's get you cleaned up son" was all he said, taking my arm and helping me to my feet. I struggled against his grasp, but after a few exchange of words I forfeited and decided I had a better chance of sticking with this street gang rather than being back home.

"Fuckin' hell that hurt!" I cursed aloud, smacking away Dex's hand as he attempted to realign my nose, in which the eurasian liuetenant Johnny had been nice enough to break with his wooden baseball bat.

"Well maybe if you'd hold still and quit bitchin' I can fix it" Dex said between clenching teeth, impatience and irritation clear on his face from being on the bottom of the totem pole, and forced to clean up the new recruit.

"Maybe if your friend, decided not to strike my face with a bat we wouldn't be in this situation!" I snapped back, making Dex wince at more words. I felt bad yelling at him, Dex couldn't have been much older than me, perhaps 1 or 2 years older considering his youthful features and attitude much line mine.

And age couldn't seperate us any more than we already were, although only knowing him for a few hours I had concluded that Dex had quite the intellectual power and mind that would put a college grad to shame.

Not only his intelligence, but maturity for a teen like him was astonishing. Last guy as young as him had a feeble attempt of sending lead through my skull, in which resulted in the latter happening to him.

"Look i'm sorry, I shouldn't be pissed at you, it's-just I dunno man..I know Julius wants to restore peace to Stilwater, but bringing in kids like you to follow him is just irony on a global scale" Dex replied after a long silence, I admired his honestly and managed to flash a weak smile making the split in my lip bust open, even if he called me a kid, he was speaking the truth.

"Sometimes you have to break sown eggs to make an omelet" He only chuckled at my age old saying and handed me a wet wash cloth to wipe off the small stream of blood flowing down my chin.

"That's what I'm afraid of, just this week we've buried about 7 recruits in the cemetery in the back of the church" Dex shook his head, sighing as he began to patch up the cuts on my forehead and cheek.

"Kids, younger than us" He continued, looking up towards the wall were a picture of a few young men clad in shades of purple posing for the camera, laid upon the table underneath looked to be momentous of those who'd fallen, considering their war tarnished condition.

"Guys you knew?" I questioned, jerking my head towards the picture hanging on the wall, he only nodded in response as his dark eyes gleamed with unshed tears, threatening to break the brim of his eyelid.

"This life, the one we live isn't for everyone. You wake up every morning wondering if today your gonna be shot in a drive-by, or end up being killed in a gang war" I hissed in response as he pressed an alcohol soaked pad against my cheek, he mumbled an apology before attatching a few butterfly bandages on my sealed wounds.

"I understand, but to tell you the truth I don't have a choice, I've already lost everything" I spoke lowly, dropping my vision toward the ground and threw my coat over my shoulder as I exited his makeshift office behind the altar.

"Hey kid, wake up!" I heard a male voice pierce through the silence of the church, and felt the pew I laid on begin to shake.

I looked up to see Troy standing over me, a lit cigarette on the side of his mouth. With his foot on the pew and his elbow resting on his left knee.

"Time to get to work" He continued, the cigarette bouncing between his lips as he spoke.

"What do we have to do?" I asked, rubbing my sleep filled eyes before sitting up and stretching.

"Got some Vice Kings on our territory, we're gonna take 'em out" Troy threw over his shoulder as headed towards the front of the church, I followed behind until a recruit I had fought earlier grabbed my forearm and turned me in his direction.

"Hey I think you forgot this" He said, pulling the pistol I took from the thug last night from a backpack that rested on a broken pew and handed it to me.

"Thanks, I appreciate it" I gave a one sided continued slipped the pistol into the back of my pants and continued to follow Troy who was waiting for me on the front steps of the church.

"Let's get going we don't have time to waste" Troy commanded as he took lead towards the parkinglot.

"Nice car" I commented, overlooking the sleek and lusterous purple sedan, complete with 24" inch rims and custom black decals that curved and an rounded almost every detail on the vehicle.

"Who said crime doesn't pay" He responded with a smirk and slid into the driver's seat, I climbed into the passenger side and felt the cool, leather upholstery stick to my skin as I sat.

"Obviously not you" We chuckled a bit and shared a few more discussions about the car's perfomance and appearance until pulling up across the street of a few men wearing yellow jerseys, track jackets and t-shirts with handguns and submachine guns slightly concealed in their sagging pants.

"Alright kid, let's take care of these fucks" Troy said as he cocked back his pistol and tucked it into his waistband, I proceded to do the same and followed behind him.

"Yo look at these white boys walkin' all up in our hood" The front man spoke up, meeting us halfway across the parking lot walking with a fake limp and holding a beltloop of his jeans.

"They look to be lost" the larger man to the right answered, clenching his teeth and showing his golden grill that matched the 16" chain hanging low around his neck.

"No your lost kid" Troy growled and drew his pistol, within seconds the four thugs laid in a pool of their own blood, Troy began to rifle through their corpses and secured anything of value, especially their weapons.

I stood there, gun still in my hand. The stinging sensation still present within my palm from the recoil of the heavy pistol.

I looked down towards the slumped over figure, the bullethole that entered through his chest and out a rough exit wound on his upper back still smoking from the heat and still pouring blood.

"Come on kid, let's get out of here" Troy called out, already carrying an arm full of jewelry, phones and guns back to his car. My eyes wandered back down towards the corpse of the man whose life I had ended before I turned around and followed Troy back to his car

"Hey, hey" I heard Troy speak up, shaking my arm making the fry in my hand fall down onto the open, chainlink fence like table and slipped through one of the openings.

I looked down and watched the salted potato slice hit the dirty ceramic tiled floor and looked up to Troy who had a bit of an apologetic look on his face but I quickly dismissed it with a wave of my hand and a forced smile.

"You've been sitting there for about 5 minutes staring out the window, what's up?" He dipped a fry in his plastic cup of ketchup, small drops fell as he raised the soaked, greasy to his lips and chewed.

I looked down at my burger and pushed it away, once remembering that Vice King's face just as I shot him was plastered all across my vision.

Even looking towards the young, pimple faced cashier's greasy forehead and poor posture still couldn't remove the images from my head.

"It's about the punk you wasted huh?" Troy continued, answering his own question. I snapped my head in his direction, as a chill went down my spine and my hears began to ring again just like after I pulled the trigger.

I only nodded in respond as Troy doing the complete opposite of what I suspected, had a bit of a understanding look to him and suprisingly let me be.

"Just one more question" I stiffened a bit, hoping he wouldn't push the subject any further.

"You gonna eat that?"


End file.
